


Slipping Underneath

by prozacplease



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Broken Cybernetic Limbs, Domestic Steve, Everyone Loves on Bucky, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jurassic Park References, M/M, Medical Trauma, Panic Attacks, Surgery, Tony Gets a Technology Boner
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-02
Updated: 2014-06-02
Packaged: 2018-02-03 03:13:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1728941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prozacplease/pseuds/prozacplease
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky's metal arm is causing him lots of problems after years of wear and tear. The prospect of surgery is scary, but Steve and Natasha are there to help. A follow-up to my previous story "Cut and Run."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. We Have a Thing

_A thousand miles down to the seabed_  
_Found a place to rest my head_

— Florence + The Machine, “Never Let Me Go”

 

“Do you even know how to cook a turkey?” Natasha asked.

Steve and Natasha were standing in the meat department of the grocery store, staring down into one of those open freezers. Thanksgiving was a week away and Steve thought they needed to celebrate. Natasha wasn’t so sure.

“Not exactly, but I can look on the internet,” Steve said. He looked up from the freezer. “Where’s Bucky?”

Natasha’s head snapped up and she looked over her shoulder. “I dunno. He was right next to me just a minute ago.”

Steve stepped into the middle of the aisle and turned all the way around, searching. This had happened before, but it still scared him. Bucky was so quiet he could wander off without either a super soldier or a highly trained international spy noticing.

Natasha thwacked Steve in the upper arm. “Found him.”

Bucky was on the other side of the refrigerated section, standing in front of all the milk. His back was to them. He was wearing the same beanie he wore when he and Steve first came to Chicago. He had since adopted it as his own sort of disguise.

Steve managed to not audibly sigh in relief. He felt bad for not trusting Bucky to not get lost or run over or whatever terrible scenario was constantly playing out in his mind. As the months went on, Steve realized that Bucky was definitely _not_ the same person he had once been.

The medical notes in the KGB file hinted at cognitive problems caused by the constant memory wipes and cryo and depatterning treatments. Bucky still had trouble talking sometimes. He never stuttered or struggled to form words. He just could not force himself to talk.

The file also noted “transient short term memory loss despite thorough mission briefing” and “instances of generalized confusion and agitation after completing assigned tasks.” All that told Steve was that they had succeeded in partially frying Bucky’s brain.

And aside from the obvious differences, there were many other things that were not the same about Bucky. Most were only obvious to Steve, like the fact that he didn’t talk the way he used to. The coarse Brooklyn accent was gone and the impression of arrogance that came with it. Now he was soft spoken, almost demure.

Steve was worried that there was nothing left of the friend that he had grown up with, the one he had followed into godforsaken foxholes in snowy European forests. But occasionally he was encouraged to believe that was not the case.

Bucky’s smile, particularly the way it made the corners of his eyes crinkle, was the same as it always had been. His orneriness had been resurfacing too. Yesterday he snapped Steve across the back of the thighs with a dish rag, making Natasha choke on her coffee.

Not looking away from Bucky, Steve asked, “Have you ever had a Thanksgiving dinner?”

“Not really,” Natasha said with a shrug.

“So then let’s have one. Bucky and I will cook and you can drink wine.”

That sounded like a good idea to Natasha and she told Steve to knock himself out. Steve picked out a frozen turkey while Natasha went over to Bucky. He didn’t even look at her, too concentrated on the jugs and cartons before him.

“What kind of milk do we usually get?” Bucky asked.

“Two percent,” Natasha said.

He pulled open the glass door of the cooler with his right hand and grabbed a half gallon jug of the correct milk with his metal hand. He was pulling the jug out when he suddenly lost his grip on it. The plastic container hit the bottom edge of the cooler just right and broke open. Both Bucky and Natasha were startled by the milk that was suddenly all over the floor. A woman shopping for yogurt turned and stared at them.

“What happened?” Natasha asked.

Bucky reached down and picked up the jug before every drop ran out. “I don’t know. My hand just let go of it,” he said in dismay.

Natasha thought he seemed really distraught. “Sweetheart, it was an accident. Don’t worry about it,” she said.

Steve saw what happened and came over with the cart just as Natasha was going to look for a clerk. Bucky was standing there in the puddle of milk, examining his hand.

“Don’t cry over spilled milk,” Steve said, trying to make joke of it.

Bucky just stared at him. He wasn’t angry or annoyed, just worried. “It was really weird,” he said. “I lost the strength in my hand.”

“Does it hurt?” Steve asked.

Bucky flexed his hand, turned his elbow inward and outward. “It’s sore up in my shoulder, but it’s been that way for a long time. I can’t feel pain in the limb.”

Steve frowned. “Maybe you need to have it looked at.”

Bucky was about to reply when Natasha came back, looking flustered. “The only person I could find was a teenage boy who said he recognized me from the internet. We should go before he comes over here and starts taking pictures for Twitter,” she said.

They weaved their way back through the store so Steve could get all the supplies for cooking a Thanksgiving dinner. Bucky was confused about Steve and Natasha’s discussion about turkey and football, but said nothing. He kept his hand hidden in the fold of his crossed arms and the fabric of his hooded jacket, trailing behind Natasha and Steve.

 

Laden with three bags each, they took the train back to Natasha’s apartment building. It was only a few blocks from one of the many elevated platforms that sat above the streets of downtown Chicago.

Natasha lived in a cosy loft apartment in a tall brick building. It was the first place she found after SHIELD imploded and she needed a place to hide out. Steve often worried that he and Bucky were outstaying their welcome after nearly seven months of crashing on her pullout couch. However, Natasha insisted they stick around every time Steve even hinted at them leaving.

Chicago was growing on Steve. He had visited the city several times when he was traveling with the USO girls back in the 1940s, but never got the chance to explore it. It was bustling and noisy like any large city, but felt a lot more relaxed than New York or Washington. And with no sight of any HYDRA activity, Steve was actually thinking about getting himself an apartment in Chicago.

He didn’t have the heart to separate Bucky and Natasha, either. He loved the way they chattered on in Russian, even when they were looking at him sideways and Natasha was giggling like a coy little _devotchka_. Russian seemed to flow better for Bucky than English did most of the time. And that was all right with Steve because it gave him hope. Bucky had come really far since he almost bled to death on Steve’s kitchen floor.

“I’m looking forward to you burning the apartment building down,” Natasha said as the three of them were putting groceries away.

“And I’m looking forward to you telling me how good the food is,” Steve said. He was busy maneuvering the turkey into the freezer.

Bucky was silently putting food in the cupboards, using only his right arm. He wasn’t going to trust the left one for a while.

“Are you okay?” Natasha asked.

“Oh, yeah. I’m fine,” Bucky said.

“Do you want me to call Stark?” Steve asked. “He’s Howard’s son. He’s really good with that kind of stuff—”

“I know who he is,” Bucky said evenly, reaching into a bag for another can.

“I’m sure he’d be more than happy to take a look at it,” Steve said.

Bucky sighed. “I don’t know, Steve.”

“It’s really obvious it’s bothering you,” Steve said.

Bucky looked over his shoulder, checking to make sure most of the groceries were put away. “I’m going to take a shower,” he said.

Steve and Natasha watched him go, then turned to each other when the bathroom door closed behind him.

“Guess I pushed it,” Steve said.

Natasha shrugged. “Remember us trying to help him take those stitches out? He can’t accept needing help with something,” she said.

“I just don’t want him to be in pain. He said his shoulder hurt.”

“I know. Just let him come around to it,” Natasha said.

Steve agreed. He knew what the problem was, but didn’t know how to circumvent it. It probably stemmed from Bucky not being allowed to complete the simplest of tasks after being pulled out of cryo repeatedly, as noted in the file. People cut his hair, shaved his face, brushed his teeth, dressed him. One technician noted an instance when their subject refused to eat and they attempted to spoon feed him. Efforts were halted when Bucky put a fork through the technician’s thigh.

Steve had trouble imagining himself being thawed out so rapidly there was no time to get the feeling back in his extremities before he was trussed up in leather and had a rifle thrust into his hands. But that’s exactly what Bucky had gone through.

Steve understood why Bucky was intent on standing in front of a mirror and cutting the sutures out of his abdomen himself, why he was reluctant to have someone look at his arm. But Steve still wanted him to get help.

Because in the end, Bucky had trouble using the scissors in the mirror and let Steve remove the stitches. So he hoped that Bucky would soon decide that he needed help with his arm, too.

Natasha got a call from Clint and went into her bedroom to answer it. Steve walked across the apartment and flopped onto the pullout couch, which was currently a mess of pillows and blankets. Natasha had tucked it into an alcove one morning when Bucky and Steve were out running.

He was replying to a text from Sam when he heard the shower turn off. Bucky came out of the bathroom in only his underwear, hair hanging wet and skin reddened from the hot water. Steve glanced up from his phone. He tried hard to not stare and failed.

Bucky had had a nice body to body to begin with. He had muscles that were defined by hard manual labor jobs that Steve never could do, like delivering large blocks of ice to people’s houses. However, the serum Bucky was exposed to just enhanced what he was already graced with.

Bucky didn’t seem to notice Steve looking at him, too focused on toweling off his hair. It was still long, but Bucky was trying to take better care of it. He let Natasha trim it for him back in September, and sometimes threw it back in a small ponytail.

Steve studied the abrupt connection of the metal arm with Bucky’s shoulder. The scarring that delineated the border between cold steel and warm flesh. The way Bucky was holding it against his chest, not using it for anything.

“How’s your shoulder?” Steve asked.

Bucky was pulling a t-shirt over his head. “It’s fine,” he said dismissively.

But he continued to baby it as he laid on the bed next to Steve, picking up one of the three books he was currently reading. One was about Captain America, one was about the Howling Commandos, and one was a biography about himself. Steve didn’t know how Bucky could juggle so much dense reading material, but he had read dozens of books on these subjects since they came to stay with Natasha.

Steve loved it when Bucky would lay the book down and talk to him about the past.

_Did this really happen like in the book? Tell me more about Brooklyn. Did I really do that? I wish I could remember your mom. You were really only 5’4” back then? I wonder if I can still dance._

Those books turned Bucky into such a chatterbox. It was almost like before the war. His eyes got bright and he gestured a little when he talked. Steve was just thankful that he had an exceptional memory and could answer all of Bucky’s questions in detail.

Steve was slowly typing out a message to Sam, phone held close to his face. Bucky licked the tip of his finger and turned a page in his book. Natasha came out of her bedroom a few minutes later.

“Aw, look at you two cuties,” she said.

Steve put his phone down. “Wanna get in the middle of this sandwich?” he asked.

“Very tempting, but I don’t think I’d fit,” Natasha said. “We should really just get you guys beds. Or a bed. Sometimes I think you like sharing.”

“How’s your boyfriend?” Steve countered.

He was a pretty proud of the way Natasha blushed at his question.

“He’s fine,” she said. “And he’d be joining us for Thanksgiving but he’s on assignment in the Ukraine. Are you going to invite Sam?”

“I did, but he’s going to Georgia to visit family.”

“More booze for me,” Natasha said.

 

The next week went by quietly. Steve didn’t say anything to Bucky about his arm, although it was obvious it was an issue. Half the time Bucky cradled it against his body, cupping the elbow with his other hand. But there were also times when he used it normally, so Steve was never sure if he should ask about it.

Steve started cooking around noon on Thanksgiving Day. Natasha was awake but not dressed, sitting at the kitchen table and already drinking a wine spritzer. Bucky was sitting on the kitchen counter. He started out reading, but Steve now had him peeling potatoes.

Steve had a big band and swing station playing on Pandora and was getting really into it. He still couldn’t dance, but he was moving with the music as he banged pots and pans around.

“ _Don't wanna boast, but I know she's the toast of Kalamazoo-zoo-zoo-zoo-zoo-zoo_ ,” Steve sang along.

Natasha watched, amused and only encouraging the silly behavior. Bucky was trying to not smile. It wasn’t long before a new song began and Steve whirled around, excited. It was mid-tempo and instrumental, with a melody led by brassy trumpets.

“This was one of your favorite songs, Buck,” he said.

Bucky looked up from the potato he was flaying. “It was?”

“You loved to dance to this. I think it’s a foxtrot.”

“I can’t even picture myself dancing with a girl to this song. Honestly.”

Natasha stood up. “That’s funny, because I’m pretty sure I have you marked down for this song on my dance card,” she said. “Your friend told me you were good.”

Bucky mouthed the words _dance card_ , looking perplexed.

Steve shrugged. “I thought I was doing you a favor, pal.”

Bucky hopped off the counter to meet Natasha, who was standing there expectantly. She almost looked serious about this whole dancing thing, despite the fact that she was wearing sweatpants and a tanktop with no bra on underneath.

“I can’t see how this could go wrong,” Bucky said as they joined hands.

It wasn’t a foxtrot as far as Steve could tell, but they were definitely dancing there in the tiny kitchen. Natasha looked a little surprised as Bucky spun her away from him. He drew her back in with the same graceful fluidity that Steve remembered envying.

It was a quality that was present in all of Bucky’s movements, whether he was dancing with a girl in her pajamas or falling off a moving car and skidding across the pavement on a freeway. It was also a unilateral sort of coordination that Steve never had.

The song was short and ended almost abruptly. Bucky attempted to pull away from Natasha unceremoniously, but was unable to do so before she pecked him on the cheek. Steve was leaning on the island, clapping.

“Man, I was jealous all over again,” Steve said with a laugh.

“Good,” Natasha said as she sat back down at the table. “I’m all a-tingle.”

Bucky was returning to his potato peeling when Steve asked him to get a few cans down from the cupboard right behind him. Bucky opened the cabinet door with his right hand and reached up with his left. One of the cans was on the top shelf and Bucky had to fully extend his arm to get it.

When he straightened his metal arm out, it whined pitifully and he felt his shoulder joint pop. It didn’t exactly hurt, but he was unable to lower his arm. Natasha watched him struggle for only a moment before she was on her feet. Her asking what was wrong caused Steve to turn away from his cooking.

“It’s stuck,” Bucky said, straining to get his arm to move. “Like really stuck.”

“Does it hurt?” Natasha asked.

“Well, now that I’ve had it above my head for a minute, yeah.”

Natasha and Steve watched as Bucky finally grabbed the metal forearm and tried to ease it down. He was pulling hard enough to worry Steve.

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Steve said. “Be gentle.”

But Bucky wasn’t. He gritted his teeth and pressed hard. The plates that made up his arm shifted and made disconcerting grinding noises. Natasha thought she could smell burning electrical components.

Bucky yelped in both surprise and pain when his arm finally snapped downward. He felt the bones in his shoulder grind against each other, the muscles and tendons burned. The arm was no longer in contracture above his head, but it was now hanging limp and useless at his side. He hissed through his teeth and squeezed the space between his shoulder and neck.

“Okay, no more helping Steve. You get to sit with me,” Natasha said.

Bucky allowed her to guide him over to a chair at the kitchen table. He sat there, looking miserable, while Natasha went to the freezer for an ice pack. Steve felt awful because he couldn’t think of anything to say that wouldn’t seem insincere. He turned back to the stove and stirred a pot.

“Steve,” Bucky said.

Steve couldn’t discern the exact emotion in Bucky’s soft voice. He sounded tired, guilty, dejected.

“Yeah?” Steve asked over his shoulder.

“I think you should call Stark,” Bucky said.

“I will tomorrow,” Steve said. “Promise.”

For the rest of the afternoon, Steve alternated between rushing around the kitchen and talking with Natasha and Bucky. Natasha was pretty buzzed and kept offering Bucky and Steve alcohol, even though neither of them could get drunk.

Ice and ibuprofen seemed to help Bucky’s shoulder and in a few hours he could move his arm again. It was still sore when Natasha started to set the table, but he insisted on helping. Steve had made enough food for probably ten people.

“This is unreal, Steve,” Natasha said, looking at the spread on the kitchen counter. It wouldn’t fit on the small kitchen table. “What are we gonna do with all of this?”

“Leftovers, I guess,” Steve said. He sawed into the turkey with surgical precision.

Bucky and Natasha thought the food was great, but Steve was critical of everything he had made. For example, the mashed potatoes had lumps in it that neither the super soldier assassin nor the spy could detect.

“You know this is better than anything either of us could have done, right?” Bucky said.

“No joke,” Natasha said. “This is great.”

Steve just shrugged, but he was smiling a little. “Thanks, guys.”

They continued to chat until they were done eating. That was when Steve came to a sudden realization and practically threw his fork down.

“You know what I forgot?”

Bucky and Natasha exchanged questioning glances.

“Pie!” Steve cried. “Thanksgiving without pie. What is with that?”

“Shame on you,” Natasha said melodramatically.

Bucky shrugged. “It’s okay. I don’t want pie.”

Natasha and Bucky shooed Steve out of the kitchen while they cleaned up and did the dishes. Natasha washed and Bucky dried. Steve listened to them talk candidly in Russian, noting how fast the words seemed to run out of Bucky’s mouth. He thought it sounded beautiful, but what were they talking about?

Natasha was laughing and Bucky sounded evasive. Once he looked over his shoulder and caught Steve’s eye without meaning to. Steve thought Bucky was blushing, but he turned around too fast for him to really tell.

Steve took a long shower and when he was done, Natasha was busy drunk dialing Clint and Bucky was curled up in bed, reading. It wasn’t particularly late, but he was tired.

Steve decided he would draw for a while and laid down next to Bucky with his sketchbook. It was quiet other than the muffled sounds of Natasha talking in her bedroom and Steve’s pencil scritching on the paper. Steve thought maybe he should feel a little bored, but he was content for once.

“What are you drawing?” Bucky asked after a while, not looking away from his book.

“I’ll show you if you tell me what you and Nat were talking about.”

Steve was planning on showing Bucky anyway, since it was a little doodle just for him. But why not use it for coercion if he could?

“She was asking me if we had a thing,” Bucky said.

He said it so nonchalantly that Steve started laughing. But it wasn’t a joke.

“Wait. Do we have a thing?” Steve asked.

“I don’t know, do we?”

Steve rolled to his side, facing Bucky. “Well, what did you tell her?”

“I said I didn’t know. She said she didn’t believe me,” Bucky said. “She was kind of drunk, you know.”

Steve shrugged. “Do you _want_ to have a thing?”

“I’m not even sure what this _thing_ is.” Bucky set down his book. “Show me your drawing.”

Steve closed the little leather-bound sketchbook. He was feeling ornery. “You were blushing.”

“What are you even talking about?” Bucky asked with a brief scowl.

“You and Natasha were chittering on and you looked over your shoulder to see if I was listening,” Steve said. “You looked right at me. And you blushed.”

Bucky closed his book and sat up. “I answered your question. Show me.”

Bucky was right. Steve sat up too and handed him the sketchbook. Rather than flipping to the last page Steve had drawn on, Bucky looked at nearly every page. Softly shaded pencil portraits of people Bucky recognized and people he didn’t. Drawings of buildings and cars. Little paneled cartoons.

The last drawing in the sketchbook was a rough doodle of Bucky standing with his arm locked above his head. A girl that looked like Natasha was running over to him with an oil can. Bucky snorted in amusement and shook his head.

“It’s missing something, though,” Bucky said.

He gestured for Steve to give him his pencil. He was a little worried about Bucky drawing in his sketchbook, but handed him the writing utensil anyway. Bucky drew quickly and passed the book back with a straight face. Bucky had added a couple of stick figures. One was Steve in a star spangled apron and the other was a man with a distinct goatee, armed with a wrench.

Steve laughed so hard he almost cried. He was still laughing a little when Bucky was suddenly in his personal space, kissing him right on the mouth.

For a moment, it was 1935 and they were both sitting crosslegged on Bucky’s bed. The one with the squeaky metal frame that would soon become the bane of their mutual existence. Steve felt that he was small and wheezy again, with skinny arms and the sharp nose he still hated. He had been yammering about something he read in _National Geographic_ and Bucky just leaned forward and kissed him.

Bucky’s scruff scraping Steve’s chin pulled him back to the present. Heat spread across Steve’s shoulders when he kissed back. Bucky pulled away too soon, nervous and not reassured by Steve’s mildly dazed expression.

“I think we have a thing now,” Steve said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   
>  [Come hang out with me on Tumblr!](http://www.iainkillsrobots.tumblr.com)
> 
> ♥ Comments are always appreciated. ♥


	2. We Have a Problem

Steve woke up with Bucky asleep on his chest. They usually slept back to back, or curled up face to face. Once Bucky had spooned him and Steve couldn’t do anything about it because his metal arm was wrapped around him. But sometimes Steve ended up on his back in the middle of the bed and there was nowhere for Bucky to go.

The sky was getting light in the east, but Steve couldn’t reach his phone to check the time without disturbing Bucky. He was nestled against Steve’s side, his metal arm draped across Steve’s torso and one leg pinning Steve’s thighs. His head was right over Steve’s heart.

Steve lifted his arm, which was asleep from Bucky’s shoulder being jammed into his armpit. He put his hand on the small of Bucky’s back, rubbing there softly and trying to get the pins-and-needles sensation to go away. He wanted to get up and go for a run, but didn’t want to move.

Bucky was breathing deep and slow; his wild mane of hair obscured his entire face. Steve vaguely wondered how they got into this position without him realizing it. He supposed he could skip running this morning. It wasn’t like Sam was around to give him shit.

He pushed his hand up the center of Bucky’s back, feeling the bumps that made up his spine. Bucky took in a deep breath and lifted his head suddenly. His hair was hanging in his eyes, but Steve could tell he was freaked out.

“Sorry,” Bucky said. His tired voice squeaked on the end of the word.

He started to move, but Steve kept his hand on his back. “No, it’s okay. Just lay down,” he said.

“I’m crushing you,” Bucky said with more conviction.

He pushed himself up with both arms and gasped when his shoulder crunched audibly.

“Oh, fuck.”

Bucky made a move to roll onto his back and Steve slid over to his own side of the bed. He knew he was taking a chance with the question he wanted to ask.

“Has this ever happened to your arm before?”

Bucky lifted his metal arm and slowly clenched his hand into a fist. The smooth steel glinted in the dim light and the inner components purred mechanically. For a moment Steve wondered if Bucky was even going to answer.

“Not that I can remember,” Bucky said. “But I do remember them working on it a few times and having it in pieces.”

Steve looked at his phone. It was almost 6:30. He wondered how early was “too early” to call Tony. The man never seemed to sleep, but he’d wait a few hours at least.

“Do you want ice?” Steve asked. He was already out of bed and headed to the kitchen.

Bucky said yes because Steve didn’t appear to be giving him a choice. Not like he minded. It was just hard to let people take care of him.

Steve returned with an icepack and crawled back into bed. He didn’t know how he could still be tired. The icepack crinkled as Bucky positioned it on his shoulder, trying to get comfortable. Steve yawned. The mattress was still warm from where they’d been sleeping before.

“I had this dream last night,” Bucky said. “One that I’ve never had before.”

“What was it about?” Steve asked, curling up on his side.

“It was dark and we were standing between two tall brick buildings, like in an alley or something. You were a lot shorter than me. You were kissing my face and then started crying.”

Steve’s heart sank before speeding up about a hundred beats. He was excited, but also felt dread.

“Were you wearing a uniform?” Steve asked.

Bucky turned to him, eyes questioning. “Yeah, I had a hat on, too.”

“That really happened, Buck. That was the night before you shipped out.”

“It made me feel sad.”

It made Steve sad too. However, he was determined to see the positive. “Yeah, but don’t you get it? You _remembered_ something. Something that wasn’t even in those books,” he said.

Steve distinctly remembered pulling himself together, not only because he was upsetting Bucky, but also because he felt his throat closing up and didn’t want to have a full-blown attack. It was all so awkward, so uncharacteristic of them to fumble around and not know what to say to each other.

“I did remember something,” Bucky said. “I just wish it was something happy.”

“It’s okay. I think you were more scared and confused than anything. I was wound up that day.”

Steve decided to not mention the riotous mixture of anger, jealousy, and grief that spilled out of him that night after months of festering. It seemed almost comical now. Bucky watching him dissolve into a crying mess, asking what was wrong and just making it worse. He promised he’d write, promised he’d come come, as if that was the only thing Steve was upset about.

Of course that was a huge part of it. But Steve was also perpetually sore about that huge 4-F stamp on his enlistment file. Bucky didn’t get it, mainly because he had been drafted and wasn’t thrilled about being sent overseas. The angriest he’d ever seen Bucky was the day he discovered that Steve was forging those forms.

But Steve realized that if he’d given up on joining the army, things would have been different. They wouldn’t be here right now.

Bucky had his forearm draped across his face, so Steve wasn’t sure if he was asleep or not. He snoozed for a few more hours and then called Tony around 9:00.

By that time, Bucky was in the shower and Natasha was still asleep. Steve was nervous as he dialed Tony’s number. He didn’t dislike the man; he was just a little too intense for Steve. Simply a disconcerting combination of intensity and nonchalance.

“Capsicle!” Tony exclaimed when he picked up the phone. “It’s been a while.”

“It has,” Steve said. “What do you know about cybernetic limbs?”

“Please tell me this has something to do with the Winter Soldier’s delightful steely appendage. I’ve been looking through those HYDRA files that Black Widow dumped on the internet,” Tony said.

He spoke so rapidly that Steve’s head was already spinning. He explained all that had happened since SHIELD was compromised, from running away to Chicago to Bucky’s arm freezing up.

“Why don’t you come to New York and I’ll have a look,” Tony said. “He’s not going to try and kill me, right?”

“No promises there,” Steve joked.

“You know the potential for incredible danger arouses me, Cap,” Tony said dryly. “There will be a jet waiting for you at O’Hare. No hurry. Just get here by tonight. I’ve got a couple interns here who are going to be over the moon.”

“Hey, thank you for doing this,” Steve said. “I mean it.”

“Of course. I love giving back to our elderly veterans.”

“Tony, goddamnit.”

 

Steve was busy packing a few things when Bucky came over and starting rummaging around for clothes. Steve didn’t even look up until Bucky said they needed to do laundry. His eyes went wide when he saw Bucky was completely naked.

“Jesus, Bucky,” Steve said.

Bucky was pulling on boxer briefs. “Because you’ve never seen me naked before,” he said. “I forgot to bring clothes into the bathroom.”

“What if you pranced out here and Natasha was up?” Steve asked.

Bucky shrugged and pulled a t-shirt over his head. “She does plenty of her own prancing in front of us,” he said.

“Yeah, in her underwear, though.”

Bucky was about to respond when Natasha came out of her bedroom in only a big t-shirt and panties. She looked annoyed and Steve worried they’d woken her up.

“Can you believe there are window washers out there?” she growled.

“For real? It’s freezing out,” Steve said.

She gestured to her room and Steve went to have a look. He peeked in her bedroom and, sure enough, there were two men outside on a hanging scaffold. That seemed odd. Who washed loft apartment windows in November?

“Aw, we’re twins,” Natasha said to Bucky, who was still only in a t-shirt and underwear himself.

They both exchanged confused glances when Steve brought his shield to the kitchen with him. Steve made coffee and told them about talking to Tony.

“Oh, he wants us there today?” Natasha asked.

“Yeah, private jet and everything. He seemed really gung-ho about it,” Steve said.

Bucky was silent, busy thinking about those window washers. Natasha was in the middle of asking him how his shoulder was when they were all startled by the sound of glass shattering.

Six men in black tactical uniforms stormed in through Natasha’s bedroom door. They had rifles strapped to their backs, but were currently brandishing the same stun batons HYDRA had attempted to subdue Steve with before.

Steve grabbed his shield off the counter and threw it as hard as he could. The narrow edge of it caught one of the men in the chest and ricocheted off another’s head with surprising force. It dropped them both and Steve snatched the shield out of the air before it hit the refrigerator.

Despite being half naked, Natasha was fighting with all her might and trying to overpower one of the men. He was trying to jab her with his weapon. Bucky yanked a knife out of the cutlery block on the counter and threw it at the man on top of Natasha. It found its mark in his throat.

He turned just as another was coming at him, weapon zapping with a frightening amount of electricity. Bucky grabbed the man’s arm and felt it snap at the elbow. He howled in anguish and headbutted Bucky in the nose. Bucky was unaware of the blood running down his face as he smashed the man’s head against the edge of the granite countertop.

Steve was struggling with one of the assailants and Bucky was running over to help him when he was caught in the side by one of the prods. The current that coursed through his body was pure agony and made all his muscles feel loose and useless. Bucky managed to break the circuit and launched himself at the one who attacked him.

He felt nothing as he straddled the man and proceeded to kill him. The first time he used his metal arm to bash the man’s head against the floor did the job. But he didn’t stop.

He couldn’t stop. His heart was beating so hard. His shoulder was burning and his arm was making worrying noises again. But he couldn’t stop.

He was perfectly aware of the blood and brains now leaking out of the back of the man’s shattered skull. But he wanted to be very sure the job was done. He didn’t hear Natasha gasp and call Steve over.

“Hey, stop. You got him,” Steve said as he grabbed Bucky’s shoulders and pulled him up from the floor. “You got him.”

Bucky jerked away from Steve’s grasp. The fight had ended without him realizing it. Natasha was standing there, pale and looking nauseated. The air was heavy with the metallic smell of blood.

Bucky looked down at his metal arm, the hand of which was twitching involuntarily. It was covered in blood all the way up to the elbow. He was breathing hard and Steve reached out to touch him again.

Bucky swatted him away with his bloody hand. “Don’t touch me.”

Steve looked at the blood smeared on his wrist with enough disgust that Bucky felt terrible underneath all the prickly layers of defense that had suddenly resurfaced.

“Go clean yourself up,” Steve said, not looking Bucky in the eye. “We need to get moving.”

Natasha went to get dressed and Steve went back to packing as fast as he could. He had a feeling that they would not be returning to Natasha’s apartment. Steve didn’t understand how Bucky could shift from dancing with Natasha and kissing him on the mouth to withdrawing from his touch. How could he become so hollowed out without any warning?

Bucky was scrubbing his metal arm in the kitchen sink. It was difficult with the limb continuing to seize and be uncooperative. It was attempting to bend sharply at the elbow. Bucky gripped the wrist and tried to force it under the hot water, but the fingers grasped his hand and wouldn’t let go.

Steve heard Bucky’s arm complaining and looked up just as Bucky cracked the elbow of the arm on the edge of the sink. The hand released his wrist, but was now hanging limp. Bucky squirted dish soap on the arm and ran it under the faucet like nothing was wrong. He couldn’t get the blood out of the grooves in the metal without something like a toothbrush. Just a rinse would have to do.

No one spoke as they left the apartment and headed for the elevated train platform down the street. Steve felt paranoid as he kept an eye out for any suspicious people or vehicles. Whoever had attacked them—presumably HYDRA—wanted them alive. That was obvious in the way they had used non-lethal weapons. Steve’s only comfort was the that they were heading somewhere very safe. They just had to get there.

 

They rode the Blue Line all the way to the airport, a trip that took almost an hour. A small white jet was waiting for them on the tarmac, where they were greeted by Agent Hill. She looked a lot different in her navy blue dress, high heels, and elegant updo.

“Maria, what are you doing here?” Steve asked.

By the expression on her face, Steve knew the three of them were looking rough.

“I’m just here to collect you,” she said. “I work for Stark Industries now. Are you guys okay?”

“We were attacked this morning,” Steve said as Maria led them up the steps and into the plane. “Possibly HYDRA.”

“Anybody hurt?” Maria asked, looking at Bucky cradling his dead arm.

Bucky shook his head and slunk past her.

Maria insisted on helping Steve and Natasha put their bags away, despite huffing in mock annoyance and saying that she was not their flight attendant. She called Tony to inform him that they were on the plane and then told the pilot they were ready to depart.

Bucky was already seated and looking out the window when Steve came over and sat down across from him. Maria and Natasha sat down on the other side of the aisle, keen to have some girl talk.

Bucky stole a furtive glance at Steve, but did not completely meet his eyes.

“I brought your books,” Steve said.

He put the books on the small table between them and pushed them over to Bucky. He couldn’t believe that Steve would remember his stupid books, of all things. But that was typical Steve. Thoughtful to the point of almost being weird.

Bucky managed to thank him and pulled a book into his lap. He didn’t even want to read, but there was nothing else to do.

The plane was bouncing down the runway and started to pull up slowly. The little aircraft shuddered as it caught air beneath its wings and Bucky found himself gripping his book tightly. He hated that rising feeling underneath his diaphragm, the shift inside his skull as his eardrums threatened to pop. Something about the knowledge that they were no longer on the ground bothered him.

No one else acted like there was a problem. Steve was already drawing. Bucky could feel his eyes on him occasionally, but did not look up from his book. He found himself reading the same sentences over and over again.

He was still reading the same page when the plane landed at LaGuardia.

A black SUV was waiting to take them across the East River and into Manhattan. Bucky didn’t even try to hide the way he twisted his neck to see the skyscrapers better. It was like seeing New York City for the first time. It felt stupid, since he was apparently a Brooklyn boy born and raised. But did that matter if he couldn’t remember most of it?

Stark Tower was one of the tallest buildings in Manhattan, jutting upwards higher than any of the surrounding structures. Bucky was studying it as they advanced slowly in traffic.

“Tony has kind of a weird sense of humor,” Steve said. “So just don’t be offended by anything that he says to you.”

Bucky didn’t realize Steve was talking to him until Natasha chimed in.

“He’s delightful,” she said. “You’re the one that can’t take a joke.”

“All I’m saying is, don’t expect this to be a relaxing experience. At least it won’t be for me,” Steve said.

“Well, that makes me feel better about all this,” Bucky said flatly.

Steve said nothing in reply. Natasha looked at Bucky but he turned away from both of them. She wanted to reassure him, but didn’t know how to say it without it sounding like a snipe at Steve. Talking in Russian was out of the question.

 

Maria led the three of them to one of Tony’s several labs, partitioned by clear glass and cluttered with large robotic arms and partially disassembled pieces of machinery. Through the glass, they could see Tony standing there talking to two people they didn’t recognize. The arc reactor in Tony’s chest was glowing faintly through the black fabric of his AC/DC t-shirt.

“Well, look who it is,” Tony said cheerfully when they entered. He motioned to the two strangers, a woman in a labcoat and protective glasses, and a man with short curly hair. “These are my two interns, Jemma Simmons and Leo Fitz.”

Natasha and Steve shook their hands while Bucky hung back. Simmons was obviously excited, but she smiled politely and said hello. Fitz was wide-eyed and open-mouthed, unable to speak.

“Simmons is a biochemist and Fitz is an engineer, both former SHIELD employees,” Tony said. “So where’s this cybernetic limb I was promised?”

Steve stepped to the side and pushed Bucky forward with a gentle hand. Bucky allowed the touch on his shoulder, but it took everything he had to not move away. Tony noted the “abused animal” look on his face as he came to stand in front of him.

“Can I touch it?” he asked, gesturing toward Bucky’s limp arm.

Bucky nodded. “I can’t move it right now,” he said.

Tony lifted the metal limb by the forearm. It was heavy and whined softly when it moved.

“Very Soviet Bloc,” Tony said, peering at the grooves in the metal. “So you have sensation in it, you just can’t control it right now?”

“Yeah. Sometimes I can’t move it at all. Sometimes it moves but I can’t control what it does.”

Tony gently manipulated the elbow joint and all the fingers, making a fist with them and then bending the wrist. “Was it like a sort of ‘stop hitting yourself’ kind of thing?” he asked.

Bucky snorted in amusement and shook his head. He liked that Tony was making an effort to talk to him directly, when he could have just as easily asked Natasha and Steve about what was going on. Bucky towered over Tony, who didn’t seem the least bit worried about being within strangling distance of the temperamental arm.

“Sorry to get so gay so soon, but will you take your shirt off? I need to see your entire arm and shoulder,” Tony said. “And we need to sit you down. You’re too damn tall.”

 

Bucky studied the floor while he sat there in the middle of the lab, shirtless. Tony was a dizzying blur of movement and chatter. Half the time Bucky didn’t know if he was talking to him or his robots or someone else. That didn’t bother him. The only thing making him nervous was all the people hovering in the background. Steve, Natasha, Fitz, and Simmons were all watching.

He recalled fuzzy memories of being surrounded men in white smocks and black rubber gloves that went up to their elbows. They were speaking, but their mouths were muffled by surgical masks. The bright lights behind their heads darkened their features as they leaned over him. Bucky tried to not delve into that part of his mind and focus on what Tony was saying.

“—so I think maybe one of the sensors slipped off your shoulder muscle or is shorting out or something. It would be an easy fix.”

Before Bucky could even ask for a clarification, Tony waved both hands and a translucent blue screen appeared between them out of nowhere.

“JARVIS, could you run an x-ray for me?” Tony asked.

“Certainly, sir,” the disembodied voice of the robot assistant said.

Bucky could see a reverse image of what Tony was now seeing on the hovering screen. A ghostly image of the bones and metal that made up his shoulder. The metal showed bright white while other tissues were partially transparent.

“James, it’s backwards for you, but can you see the sensors in your shoulder?” Tony asked.

After recovering from the initial confusion of being called by his rarely used first name, Bucky focused on the blue screen. Tony was pointing to a series of small white circles that dotted his shoulder. In the x-ray, it looked like the sensors were floating there, but he knew they were actually deeply embedded in his body. The sensors were attached to thin wires that ran to the metal arm.

“JARVIS, pull up the Winter Soldier specs for the cybernetic limb, please,” Tony said.

Another screen appeared and Tony turned it around so it was facing Bucky. It showed a series of ancient-looking blueprints for the metal arm and how it attached to his shoulder. He’d never seen these plans. He supposed HYDRA had not made him privy to that information so he would remain dependent on their expertise.

“So you control your arm with these sensors that are attached to your shoulder muscles,” Tony said. “They just removed whatever was left of your real arm and replaced it with metal, but they had to devise a way for your body to communicate with the arm.”

Bucky was glad Tony was explaining this like he was an idiot. It barely made any sense as it was.

“This sensor up here—” Tony pointed to the one on top of Bucky’s shoulder, near his neck. “—looks like it’s out of place. There might be some metal rubbing against your shoulder socket too.”

“Can you fix it?” Bucky asked.

“With some general anesthesia and a simple outpatient surgery, you bet,” Tony said, swiping at the screens so they disappeared.

Bucky hated the way his stomach felt like it was suddenly full of ice. He couldn’t remember ever being put under anesthesia, but knew that it had probably happened. He also knew that he didn’t want to do it again.

“You can put me under?” Bucky asked, trying to stay calm.

Tony didn’t reply right away. Instead he opened a small screen that was showing blood pressure and heart rate readings. Bucky could only assume it was his own vitals being shown, especially with the subtle expression of concern that crossed Tony’s face.

“I’ll bring in an anesthesiologist, but yeah,” Tony said. “Very safe. Are you okay?”

Bucky stood up suddenly and Tony closed the screen in alarm. Bucky hated the way everyone shrunk back a little when he started to move. No one stopped him from rushing out of the lab with no shirt on, metal arm hanging stupidly useless at his side.

He had no idea where he was going, but he didn’t stop walking down the hall. It felt like his heart was beating out of control and there was a distinct sense of entrapment despite the spacious hallway. Waves of alternating hot and cold washed over him and his mouth filled with spit. He didn’t realize how nauseous he was until a gag creeped up his throat. He tried to swallow it back down but doubled over and heaved anyway. Nothing came up.

“Buck?”

Steve was suddenly there, putting a hand on the center of his back. Bucky vaguely wondered if he was dying because, for a brief moment, he was watching both of them standing there in the empty hallway. He dry heaved again.

Steve asked what was wrong even though he knew a panic attack when he saw one. Bucky was crouched over, hyperventilating. He heard Steve telling him to take deep breaths, but the edges of his vision were already black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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>  [Come hang out with me on Tumblr!](http://www.iainkillsrobots.tumblr.com)
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> ♥ Comments are always appreciated. ♥


	3. We Have a Solution

Steve caught Bucky as he fell, but his dead weight propelled them to the floor. Down the hallway, the door to the lab slid open and Natasha stepped out. She was looking for them.

“Nat,” Steve barked.

Her head snapped around and she ran over to them. “What happened?”

“I think he just fainted,” Steve said as he felt Bucky’s pulse in his neck. It was steady, but very fast.

A genetically modified super soldier assassin fainting like an over-excited Victorian debutante. It might have been funny if the events leading up to it hadn’t been so scary and confusing.

“You need to lay him in the floor, Steve,” Natasha said.

Steve didn’t even realize that he had Bucky gathered up in his arms like a small child. His neck was bent at a sharp angle and that was not conducive to maintaining an airway. Natasha helped Steve straighten Bucky out on the slick tile floor of the hallway. She was busy elevating Bucky’s legs when his eyelids fluttered.

Bucky said something that neither of neither Steve nor Natasha understood. It sounded more like a distressed noise than anything. Steve hated how confused Bucky looked as he stared up at the ceiling. It reminded him too much of that night they escaped the HYDRA facility.

When Bucky started to sit up, it was Natasha who eased him down and put a hand on his head.

“It’s okay, babe,” she said softly. “You just passed out.”

She didn’t stop touching him, even when he rolled to his side and retched again. Still nothing came up. Steve saw Tony come out of the lab, followed closely by Fitz and Simmons. They started to approach and stopped when Steve held up a hand. He wasn’t for sure, but he thought maybe part of Bucky’s panic attack was from feeling overwhelmed by the attention he was receiving from so many people at once.

Tony was giving him a serious “what the fuck is going on” look and Fitz and Simmons were craning their neck to see the infamous Winter Soldier curled up on the floor. Natasha nodded at Steve; she had it under control. Steve got up off the floor and went over to them.

“What happened? Was it something I said?” Tony asked. His expression was nonchalant, but his voice did not hide the concern he felt.

“Panic attack, I think. Fainted before I could do anything to calm him down,” Steve said. “I think he’s okay.”

“His heart rate spiked when I mentioned general anesthesia. Does that mean anything to you?” Tony asked.

“He’s been experimented on,” Steve said under his breath.

“I know. I’ve read all the files. I was trying really hard to not be my usual excitable self,” Tony said. “I’m sorry I stressed him out. You know how cybernetic limbs get me hot.”

Steve shook his head. “No, you were fine. I don’t think it’s your fault. He’s been really spooky since this morning and I think being examined on top of that put him over the edge.”

“Well, let’s get him some water and put him up somewhere that is not the floor. I’ve also got a stockpile of liquid valium I’d be more than happy to share if he’s still keyed up,” Tony said. “I’d still like to do the procedure in the morning, if possible.”

Down the hall, Bucky dry heaved again and Steve looked over his shoulder. Natasha met his gaze, worried.

 

Bucky was awoken by sharp poke in the bend of his normal arm. He could hear his own voice, but it sounded far away and he couldn’t make sense of what he was saying.

But then felt Steve’s hands on him, shushing him and soothing him, as he woke up from what felt like unconsciousness. He vaguely wondered if the surgery was over. Bucky just couldn’t figure out why he felt so nervous and so relaxed at the same time. His eyes opened and he saw someone leaving the darkened room.

He was tucked into a soft bed and Steve was sitting on the edge of it. He was confused. He didn’t know what time it was or where they were.

“Hey, how are you feeling?” Steve asked.

Bucky couldn’t deny that he was feeling pretty good, but he was perplexed by the words coming out of his own mouth. He was saying that he didn’t want to have surgery. But wasn’t it already over?

Steve was rubbing his thigh. “You have to let them fix your arm, Buck,” he said.

Bucky’s heart sank. Slowly, it all came back to him, along with the fear and apprehension. Even with the drugs pumping through him, calming his heartbeat and talking his body into staying still, he was scared.

“What’s going on?” he asked, voice grating like a rusty hinge.

There was a pause as Steve decided where to start. “You had a panic attack and passed out earlier today,” Steve said. “You’ve been resting for a while.”

“I don’t remember any of that,” Bucky said, glad that the room was dark and Steve couldn’t see the tears in his eyes. But they were apparent in his voice. He was terrified that he was forgetting things again.

“It’s okay, Buck. That’s normal when you faint,” Steve said.

He scooted closer and slipped his arms around Bucky, who surprised him by not pulling away. He put a hand on the back of Bucky’s head, holding him there against his shoulder. Solid and tight.

But instead of being reassured, Bucky just started crying. He was a vertiginous mixture of calm and anxious, frightened and comforted. Nothing made any sense.

Steve was worried about the sudden tears and thought about pulling away, but Bucky was holding him back with his one functioning arm and had his face pressed firmly into his shoulder. Steve found himself rocking Bucky just a little bit.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Steve said. “Just tell me what’s been going on.”

“I’m scared I’ll wake up from surgery and not remember anything. Like before.”

“Anesthesia is nothing like what you went through, Buck. I promise. You will wake up and you might be a little confused at first, but I promise you will remember,” Steve said.

His heart physically ached as he kissed Bucky’s forehead, his wet eyes, his nose, the sides of his face. This all felt familiar, except this time Bucky was the one crying. And neither of them had to leave in the morning.

“I would never ask you to go through with something like this if I didn’t think it was safe. Tony knows what he’s doing,” Steve said. “It’s okay to be scared, but we gotta do this.”

“Only if you’ll be there,” Bucky said.

Steve rubbed Bucky’s arms up and down. “I will be there,” he said.

Bucky leaned back in bed, sniffing. The anti-anxiety medication was now fully working and there was a strange, thready sort peace in his mind.

“Did I have a shot or something?” he asked.

“Tony gave you some valium when you were coming to,” Steve said. “Hope that’s okay.”

Bucky nodded, fiddling with the edge of the comforter. “So when does he want to do the procedure?”

“Well, he kind of sounded like he wanted to do it tomorrow morning as long as you were ready.”

That seemed reasonable to Bucky with the good dope running through him. He didn’t care about how he’d feel in the morning. “I want to get it over with,” he said.

Steve nodded. “That’s probably for the best,” he said.

“I’m sorry for being such a basketcase today,” Bucky said. “Things would have been a lot easier without me losing it at every opportunity.”

“It’s okay,” Steve replied with a little laugh. “You keep things interesting.”

There was something about the way Steve looked down at his lap when he laughed. It made Bucky want to kiss him on the mouth. Just like the way Steve laughing over his stick figures made him want to kiss him the night before. He felt completely undeserving of all his understanding and patience. Maybe he was high, but all he could think about was how much he loved this man.

Of course he couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud. It didn’t feel like the right time. But he definitely felt that love when Steve lifted his normal hand and kissed his knuckles.

Bucky reached forward with the same hand and gently grabbed the collar of Steve’s t-shirt. He pulled Steve on top of him and their mouths met. Steve pecked the corner of his mouth first, testing the motion, before Bucky moved his head and they kissed full-on.

It was right and it was perfect and Bucky was still scared but now felt like he could face it without having a breakdown. Steve was just about to tongue him when he sensed a shadow in the doorway and sat up.

“Sorry,” Natasha said, although she didn’t seem that apologetic. A sideways smirk was pulling at her pretty mouth, but it wasn’t smug or condescending.

“What’s up?” Steve asked, rubbing the back of his neck nervously.

He couldn’t help the way his face was flushed. The fact that Bucky didn’t seem at all bothered by them getting caught just made it worse. But who knows what he and Natasha had discussed in their rapid-fire Russian?

“Tony is going to bed early for once and he wants to know if the surgery is going ahead,” she said.

Steve glanced over at Bucky, who was no help. “It is,” he replied.

Natasha nodded and backed out of the doorway, still smiling as she turned on her heel and left. Steve flopped face down on the bed with a groan. He knew it was safe with Natasha if he wanted to keep it a secret, but he still wanted to die a little. At least Tony didn’t come asking around himself.

They slept curled up together, Bucky sprawled out on his side with a pillow tucked under his lifeless, cumbersome arm and Steve spooning him. Steve tried to brush Bucky’s hair out of the way but it was a hopeless venture. For the first time, he realized that Bucky smelled exactly like he used to. That same neutral body scent he had sought out in the shirts Bucky left behind in his apartment, the one he could smell in his sheets after Bucky spent the night.

If it wasn’t for a multitude of factors—the long hair and the metal arm and the fact they were now both jacked beyond belief—they very well could have been back in Brooklyn. Besides, they weren’t that far away from their old home tonight. And Steve had a pretty good imagination.

 

It was early in the morning when Maria came to get them. Steve had been up for hours, having already gone for a run and eaten breakfast, but Bucky was barely awake. Steve hadn’t disturbed him because he couldn’t eat before the procedure anyway.

Bucky wished he was still shot full of benzodiazepines as he and Steve followed Maria to yet another one of Tony’s labs. This one was smaller and in better order. Tony was there, along with Fitz, Simmons, and a small medical team.

Bucky saw the operating table draped with sheets and felt hot and sick all over again. He tried to look for things that were different than all the other times. Everyone was dressed in non-threatening sets of scrubs. No one had masks or smocks on yet. The room was a comfortable temperature. There were no medical instruments laid out for him to see. The table had no restraints.

And Steve was right there next to him.

But his heart was still pounding.

“Shirt off again. Give the girls a show,” Tony said, referring to Simmons and the female nurse.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t much of a show with an arm that didn’t cooperate. But he did get the long sleeved shirt off without any help and handed it to Steve. Simmons turned away every time his eyes fell on her.

When he hopped up on the table, however, it _did_ feel a lot like the times before. He wondered who was going to be doing what during the actual surgery, but was afraid he would throw up if he opened his mouth to ask. He guessed it didn’t matter. It was all out of his control.

The anesthesiologist was very nice and introduced herself when she came over. He forgot her name immediately after she said it. The nurse was busy sticking sensors all over his torso, clipping a pulse oximeter to his fingertip.

Tony decided Bucky needed to pull his hair back and Simmons practically ripped her hair tie out to give it to him. Steve gathered Bucky’s hair back and secured it high on his head so he wouldn’t be lying on the ponytail itself. Everyone was being so gentle, but all the hands on him were freaking him out.

“Heart rate is 120 beats per minute,” JARVIS said, responding to the five or so sensors that were talking to him wirelessly. “Patient is experiencing tachycardia, sir.”

“You’re not helping,” Tony said in a sing-song voice that didn’t hide his nerves.

Bucky jerked away a little when the nurse tried to thread oxygen tubing around his ears and everyone in the room jumped. The knowledge that all these people were on edge because of him was painful. He tried to relent. Tried to access that part of his reprogrammed mind that complied mindlessly when a HYDRA technician pushed a bite guard between his teeth or they stripped him naked for no reason other than humiliation.

Steve was now the only one touching him. He had one hand on the side of Bucky’s face and the other was brushing stray pieces of hair out of his eyes. Bucky tried to be limp, non-threatening, compliant. He focused on Steve’s hands.

“I’m going to start your IV,” the anesthesiologist said.

Bucky didn’t watch her push the bore needle into the big vein in the center of his hand, but he felt the burning pinch.

“I don’t want to do this,” he found himself saying. “I don’t want—”

But he wasn’t saying it to the doctor who had already pushed the anesthesia into the line and now had a horrified look on her face. He wasn’t saying it to Tony or Steve or anyone else in the room. He was saying it to the men who punched him in the face when he couldn’t hit back, the men who molested him when he was drugged and immobilized in stirrups.

Even if he couldn’t consciously remember most of those things happening, they were still imprinted in the animal part of his brain that he was simultaneously trying to access and lobotomize—the Winter Soldier cortex.

“Relax, chief,” Tony said. He was anxiously watching for signs that Bucky was losing consciousness.

“We’ve gotta do this, Buck,” Steve added. He scrubbed at his eyes with one hand and kept the other on Bucky’s head. “I’m right here. It’s okay.”

Bucky felt warmth spreading up his arm as his vision blurred. Tears slid down his temples and into his hairline. JARVIS began to state his rapidly slowing heart rate but he didn’t hear the reading before he was out.

Steve had to leave. He couldn’t stand to stay and watch the inevitable—blinding surgical lights and the drape of blue surgical towels, the reek of bright orange betadine and silvery hemostats sticking out of exposed muscle tissue. He wasn’t exactly sure what they were even going to do or how they were going to do it. And he really didn’t care as long as Bucky came out of it okay.

Natasha was frantic when she found Steve crying in the hallway and he felt stupid for having to explain that there was nothing seriously wrong. She hugged him anyway and they waited together, passing the time by seeing who could do the longest wall sit (Steve) or who could do a legitimate cartwheel (Natasha).

The surgery only took an hour, but it felt like the entire day had passed by the time Tony came out of the lab looking triumphant. Steve wondered if maybe the man really did get off on repairing cybernetic limbs.

The medical team was clearing out when Tony led Natasha and Steve into the room. Fitz was sterilizing and putting away the robotic tools they had used and Simmons was removing the disconnected IV needle from Bucky’s hand.

Tony yammered about how they’d replaced all the wiring that ran to the arm and moved the sensor that had migrated. They also realigned the shoulder socket with the metal joint that rested in it. He was particularly enthralled with the part where they ran a small current through the wiring and the metal arm made a fist. Steve guessed that meant it was fixed.

Bucky’s whole chest was stained dark orange and his shoulder was heavily bandaged. He was slowly coming to, bleary eyes blinking like his eyelids were weighted.

“Did you have to do this when he was already out?” Natasha asked, gesturing to the ponytail.

“Nope, he actually let me do it,” Steve said. “Simmons provided the hair tie.”

“Do you think I could have that back?” Simmons asked as she covered Bucky with a couple hospital blankets.

Natasha gently pulled it out of Bucky’s hair and handed it to Simmons. She put it around her wrist instead of tying her hair back with it. Natasha and Steve tried to not laugh. They were going to fight over who got to tell Bucky about this.

“Are you waking up, James?” Tony asked, speaking a little louder than normal.

Bucky pulled his arm out from under the blankets and draped his flesh-and-blood arm over his eyes. The lights were so bright. He didn’t speak, but made an affirmative noise in his throat. He was shivering even though he wasn’t cold.

“Do you feel okay?” Steve asked.

“Queasy,” Bucky replied.

Tony very quietly brought over a trashcan. “Well, we’re gonna sit you up. It’s okay if you have to puke. That’s normal,” he said.

Steve and Tony eased Bucky into a sitting position. He was pale and trembling, sitting there with his eyes closed because all he wanted to do was sleep. He allowed Tony to secure his metal arm in a special sling for shoulder injuries. It let his arm to hang comfortably, but also had a velcro strap that secured it tightly to his side.

“The surgery was a success, by the way,” Tony continued. “It will be a few weeks before it’s healed and you can get back to opening stubborn jars or whatever you’re using this puppy for now.”

Bucky didn’t even react because yesterday he’d killed three people with that arm. He wasn’t feeling much of anything from the anesthesia and pain medication, so it didn’t hurt went he turned his head to look at the arm.

“The star is gone,” he said, slurring just a little bit.

“Fitz used a Dremel to take that paint off,” Tony said. “Since you’re not government property anymore. Hope that’s okay. We cleaned it too.”

“Thank you,” Bucky said.

He didn’t know he wanted that red star removed until it was already gone. He couldn't even remember when it was painted on. It had just showed up, much like all the other random bruises and abrasions that used to appear on his body without explanation.

He felt so tired as he swung his legs over the edge of the table. Everything was stiff and he knew he’d be sore when all the drugs wore off and left him open like an exposed nerve. The nausea that came and went was different from what he experienced yesterday. Easier to control and swallow down, no spit in his mouth.

Steve helped Bucky stand and didn’t let go of him because he was so unsteady. As Steve ushered him slowly down the hallway, Bucky thought about how much this reminded him of their trip to the train station in Chicago. Needing support to stay standing. Needing someone to literally hold his hand through everything. He felt a mild flash of anger that he could direct at no one but himself. He was tired of needing help.

They went into a living area that Bucky had never been in and Steve helped him lay down on a large sectional sofa. Natasha came in with an armful of blankets.

Bucky willed himself to let them fuss over him—to let them touch him—when all he wanted was to be left alone and figure it out himself. Even with his mind altered by massive amounts of medication, he didn’t feel like he deserved anything else.

Laying comfortably with one arm in a sling was basically impossible, but he was tired enough that he wasn’t too bothered. He pulled the blankets up under his chin and laid facing the back of the couch.

Natasha and Steve sat on the other side of the sectional and watched TV with the volume on low. Natasha flipped through channels while Steve sent a text to Sam.

“Have you ever seen _Jurassic Park_?” Natasha asked.

Steve didn’t look up from his phone. “Are there dinosaurs? Then yeah.”

Natasha set the remote down and turned to Steve, looking to make sure Bucky was asleep.

“So why didn’t you just tell me you were into guys?” she asked.

“What are you talking about?” Steve replied with a frown.

“When I was suggesting dates for you last year? Why didn’t you tell me I should be looking for guys?”

Steve gave up on the text message he was writing and put his phone in his lap. “Because I like both, okay?”

“Okay, well, you should have said something.”

“Telling you that I was still carrying a torch for a HYDRA operative who shot you twice didn’t seem like a good idea at the time,” Steve said.

“That’s not what I meant,” Natasha said. “Besides, I bit Clint and punched him in the head and he still loves me.”

“You know I’m not very forthcoming about things like that anyway,” Steve said.

“I know, I’m just teasing you. So what was that thing with Agent Carter, then?” Natasha asked.

“I loved her too,” Steve said, looking at the wall. He’d never told anyone this kind of stuff. “Bucky and I used to mess around, but we decided even before the war that it wasn’t going to work out between us. We agreed to just be friends. Things were different back then.”

“So you’re kind of getting a second chance at what was meant to be in the first place,” Natasha said with a small smile.

Steve shrugged. “I guess. I don’t know what he wants.”

“Well, he was kissing you back last night, wasn’t he? Not to mention that he always looks at you like you’re in the only person in the room,” she said.

Steve shook his head. He was uncomfortable, even though it was all true. He wanted to change the subject. “So what are we gonna do? Go back to Chicago?” he asked.

“D.C. might be better,” Natasha said. “Your apartment isn’t full of dead bodies like mine is. Sam’s there, it’s closer to Tony, and they allow gay marriage.”

Steve was confused by the last part for only a moment before he realized what she was talking about. He pulled a throw pillow from behind his back and started halfheartedly beating her in the head with it. Natasha was laughing so hard she had to cover her mouth. She didn’t want to wake Bucky up, but it would have been worth it. It was so fun to rile Steve.

“Natasha, shut up,” Steve hissed, laughing a little himself. “You’re ridiculous.”

Natasha grabbed the pillow away from Steve and hit him back a few times. “I was just trying to list all the pros of going back to Washington.”

“You know, I was going to offer to let you live with us, but now I’m reconsidering it,” Steve said, not defending himself against the blows from the pillow.

“I think I might get my own place. But just down the block or maybe in the same building. I’d miss Bucky.”

“Oh, thanks,” Steve said with a scoff.

“Sorry about it. He’s my little Russian conversation partner,” Natasha said.

“Right, you need to talk about me without me knowing.”

Natasha sat back against the couch, hugging the pillow. “We usually just talk about how cute you are,” she said with a little shrug. “Or at least Bucky does.”

Steve snorted. “Whatever. You probably just laugh about how my torso is shaped like a dorito or whatever kind of potato chip the internet compares me to,” he said.

Natasha started laughing again. “Steve, what are you even talking about?”

He waved his hand dismissively and was about to say something when Bucky stirred. He sat up fully, looking exhausted and mildly annoyed.

“Oh no, did we wake you up?” Natasha asked.

Bucky nodded and kicked the blankets off of him. Steve and Natasha were exchanging _oh shit oh shit oh shit_ glances as Bucky stood. It looked like he was going to leave by the way he was dragging the blankets off the couch with him. Instead he came and sat on the other side of Steve, covering himself once more.

“Sorry,” Natasha said, genuinely apologetic.

But Bucky said it was okay and just laid his head on Steve’s shoulder. It ended up being a lot more comfortable than trying to lie down. Natasha took a hint from Bucky and laid her head on Steve’s other shoulder while they watched the rest of _Jurassic Park_.

Steve felt like he was Dr. Grant and Natasha and Bucky were Tim and Lex, sleeping on his shoulders during the helicopter ride at the end of the movie. Except he was sure Tim wouldn’t be drooling on his t-shirt in an anesthetized stupor and Lex wouldn’t be trying to take selfies of the three of them together.

Natasha eventually managed to get one without Steve’s hand covering his face and sent it Tony, Sam, and Clint. And Steve couldn’t yell at her because Bucky was finally asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   
>  [Come hang out with me on Tumblr!](http://www.iainkillsrobots.tumblr.com)
> 
> ♥ Comments are always appreciated. ♥


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